Newsletter

Second day of school bus issues

Savannah Morning News

Students board buses for the ride home from DeRenne Middle School. Many of the first day glitches experienced by the new school bus management company, First Student Inc., had been corrected by the second day of school.

Savannah Morning News

DeRenne Middle School students Andrew Pierce (left) and Paris Nelson (right) look out the window of the bus after school. Many of the first day glitches experienced by the new school bus management company, First Student Inc., had been corrected by the second day of school.

Bus service on the first day of school seemed like dejá vu as children waited and waited for late buses, and parents' calls to the transportation office went unanswered.

"I waited for 30 minutes yesterday and then just drove my son to school," said Angelika Caruthers.

Taking the bus home wasn't any easier.

Monday, her son Demetrius' bus from Charles Ellis Elementary School didn't arrive at the stop near their southwest Chatham County home until 5:35 p.m.

Tuesday was better. He was home around 4:30 p.m.

The second day with First Student, the new transportation provider, has made a tremendous difference, said Bloomingdale Elementary Principal John King.

"Yesterday, several buses were late, and we stayed here until all the children got home safely," King said. "We were here until 7 p.m."

King said although it wasn't easy to get through, he called First Student and his concerns are being addressed.

Tuesday at 5 p.m., three students were waiting for buses.

"They are more than 100 percent better than yesterday," he said.

That was the experience across much of the district.

Pick-up and drop-off times improved the second time around, according to district officials, and they'll keep getting better in the coming days.

"This morning was a vast improvement," said Otis Brock III, chief operations officer for Savannah-Chatham County Public Schools.

Brock said he didn't have any hard data detailing the number of late buses on day one and day two but knew First Student's second day on the job had gone better because he was no longer inundated with phone calls.

"My Blackberry battery is not nearly as dead as it was yesterday at this time," Brock said.

School officials have met with First Student to discuss the first day problems and set goals and expectations for improvement.

There are four major problems being addressed:

Getting students across the county to specialty schools, formerly known as magnets.

"It's always our biggest challenge logistically when we have kids traveling all across the county, say from Georgetown to the islands," Brock said.

Breakdowns

"We have had several breakdowns and the buses that were supposed to be here to back them up had to be used to run other routes," said Gary Reese, First Student region safety manager.

Unanswered phone calls

"I told them they have to solve this phone problem," Brock said. "People have some level of tolerance for route problems during the first few days, but it is unacceptable that people can't get answers when they call."

Non-local drivers

"There are about 20 non-local drivers from South Carolina who will be replaced by drivers who are in training and working to complete their certification," Reese said. "The local drivers know most of the kids they're supposed to be picking up. But some of the drivers from out of town may be leaving them at the stops because they think they're waiting for another bus."

First student staff worked through the night adjusting routes to avoid heavy traffic and keep drivers from bypassing students.

They have a team assigned solely to answer telephones and another team to log voice messages left by parents who can't get through during a flood of calls.

Trainees have been assigned to ride with the temporary, non-local drivers so they will be familiar with their routes and students. Once new drivers are certified, they'll be able to take over the routes with no problems.

The adjustments haven't solved all of the problems, but many drivers had cut as much as 30 minutes off of their route time Tuesday, according to Reese.

"We hope the community can give us some time to work out some of these routing issues, Reese said. "Each day we're going to strive to do better than the day before."

Caruthers said she's willing to give them one more day to get her son to school and back in a reasonable amount of time.

"I can't wait around not knowing if he got to school," she said.

First day progress report

Savannah-Chatham County School officials have given themselves good marks for their first-day performance. School Superintendent Thomas Lockamy met with district leadership Tuesday to discuss progress toward meeting his "non-negotiable" goals for the year: textbooks in every classroom and in the hands of every student, students arriving on time for school and arriving at home on time and safely, school uniforms and every student in class and participating in the learning environment, not standing in line for late registration.

Here's the district's first-day self-assessment:

Compliance with the uniform policy among students in grades k-8 was very high with a number of schools reporting every child in uniform and others only reporting two or three children without. Those children were given "loaner" uniforms for the day.

Long late registration lines that dogged staff at the school system's central office last year were non-existent. The small number of children who reported to school without having registered were in class by the end of the day.

There were enough text books to go around.

There were approximately 90 openings for teachers district-wide - about 4 percent - which, in comparison to previous years, is extremely low.

MARINE CORPS BASE CAMP BUTLER, Okinawa, Japan — Marine Corps Captain James E. Frederick, who ejected from a Marine F/A-18 on Dec. 7, was pronounced dead after his body was found during search and rescue operations.